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Jakarta Post

Govt blames virus testing drop on long weekend

Rizki Fachriansyah (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Wed, November 4, 2020

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Govt blames virus testing drop on long weekend Wiku Adisasmito (BNPB/-)

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ational COVID-19 task force spokesperson Wiku Adisasmito has noted a drop in coronavirus testing over the past seven days and has attributed it to the long weekend last week.

Speaking during an online press conference on Tuesday, Wiku said the country had tested 82.51 percent of the samples taken as of the third week of October.

However, he said the percentage had dwindled as the country entered the final two weeks of last month, which included a long weekend that started on Oct. 28.

“As noted, in the fourth and fifth weeks of October, which coincided with [the long weekend], the testing rate dropped to 74.78 percent and 62.66 percent, respectively,” Wiku said.

He called on stakeholders to prevent any further drop in testing, saying that Indonesia was “on the right track”.

Indonesia tested 169,183 new people between Oct. 26 and Nov. 1, a 16.20 percent decrease from the 201,912 new people tested in the preceding week.

The task force previously urged the public to consider the risks before deciding to travel during the long weekend and reminded people to adhere to government health protocols.

Wiku claimed the discrepancy in the number of suspected COVID-19 cases, which dropped significantly from 169,833 on Oct. 28 to 68,888 on Oct. 29, was the result of a data synchronization process.

“We are fixing and synchronizing data between regions […] and the central government or the Health Ministry,” he said. “It involves the technique of gathering vast amounts of data, which require time to process.”

He said the Health Ministry had coordinated with regional administrations to streamline COVID-19 data and that the effort had produced significant changes to the database.

Previously, the KawalCOVID19 initiative highlighted a decline in the testing of both samples and people.

Commenting on the situation, Dicky Budiman, an Indonesian epidemiologist at Australia's Griffith University, said the lack of testing was significant because the extent of the pandemic in the country had not been reliably mapped. 

Dicky said low testing capacity had been a longstanding problem for Indonesia and that the situation was not changing. "Many policymakers will assume the situation has been brought under control because of the low testing coverage. It will mislead them into making [incorrect] decisions in response,” he said. 

He added that a low number of reported daily cases was not a strong basis on which to conclude that the COVID-19 situation had improved, especially in countries with low levels of testing such as Indonesia. 

The number of COVID-19 cases reported on Oct. 31 was 3,143. The figure fell to 2,696 the next day and 2,618 on Monday before a slight increase to 2,973 on Tuesday.

As of Tuesday, Indonesia had recorded a total of 418,375 confirmed COVID-19 cases and 14,146 deaths linked to the disease. (iwa)

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